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what goes against standard transit use theory is that the the lower transit ridership per hour was in the local circulator
correlation between student population and transit rider- systems.
ship is stronger than the correlation between elderly pop- Although this study focused on data from only one com-
ulation and transit ridership. The youth were more likely munity--Margate in Broward County, Florida--the results
to use transit than the elderly. are consistent with typical transit analyses of data from
· Population density is highly positively correlated to pas- many areas, with the exception of the finding that youth
sengers per revenue-hour in the routes analyzed, so stan- were more likely to use transit than the elderly. This general
dard transit use theory holds firmly in this local circulator consistency of findings indicates that measuring similar
setting as well. Higher population density results in higher services within a given geographic area would likely lead to
transit usage. more specific findings.
· The segment of owner-occupied units with no car was
strongly correlated to passengers per revenue-hour. This
finding is consistent with standard transit use theory, which
Establishing Performance
Measurement Programs
says that lack of auto ownership increases transit use.
· The segment of owner-occupied units with one car is also Evaluating suburban services is an important component of
positively correlated with passengers per revenue-hour. the successful implementation of suburban services. Not only is
This might be because the owner-occupied households it important to ensure that the form of transit is appropriate for
with only one car have more people in the household with the market, but equally important is ensuring that expectations
mobility needs that are not being met with a single car. in a community are commensurate with performance. No other
This finding is again consistent with standard transit use form of public transit engenders more local characteristics than
theory, which says that lack of auto ownership increases suburban transit. Suburban transit is at the local level where the
transit use. balance between resource expenditures and the need for
· The segment of renter-occupied units with no car is posi- enhanced service coverage must be determined.
tively correlated with passengers per revenue-hour, once Following is an example of how one agency, in the imple-
again consistent with the notion that the absence of personal mentation of a broad family of services, manages perform-
transportation, especially in the case of persons renting ance and expectations for service performance with its
units, implies transit use for many trip purposes. stakeholders and the broader community.
· The segment of renter-occupied units with one car is Denver RTD has established guidelines in its service stan-
slightly negatively correlated with passengers per revenue- dards that the least productive 10% of routes, based on either
hour. Thus, as renters obtain personal vehicles, ridership subsidy per boarding or boardings per hour, need to be
on the shuttle system declines. This finding might reflect evaluated for marketing, revision, or elimination. The same
that renter-occupied units have fewer people and less travel evaluation is applied to routes when both subsidy per board-
demand. ing and boardings per hour fall within the least productive
25%. The calculation of the 10% and 25% standards is made
It might seem obvious that certain demographic charac- from the annual unweighted data, assuming that the data
teristics contribute to better transit ridership, but with such have a normal distribution and using the appropriate formu-
limited experience in the provision of local circulators in pri- las for standard deviation and confidence intervals. However,
marily suburban settings, it was of value to confirm if normal the standard deviation is applied to the weighted average.
indicators of transit use potential apply to local circulators as Table 5-5 gives the weighted averages and standards by class
they do to regular fixed-route transit service in a more of service.
regional setting. As noted above, there is a very strong positive RTD's general approach is as follows. Develop a family of
relationship between transit use and population density for services suited to a variety of markets. Connect all the serv-
the local circulators that were studied. In short, the higher the ices together to accommodate the region's dispersed travel
density, the higher the transit ridership per hour was for the patterns. Match the level of service with demand, thereby
local circulators. improving performance and sustainability.
There was also a high positive correlation between lack of car At RTD,"performance" is a term often used interchangeably
ownership and transit use. Perhaps a little surprising was that with "effectiveness" and "efficiency." "Effectiveness" measures
the relationship was even stronger for owner-occupied attainment of the objective--maximize ridership within the
dwellings without cars (0.69) than for renter-occupied budget--and is presented on the vertical axis of Figure 5-19
dwellings without cars (0.52). As expected, there was also a as subsidy per vehicle. "Efficiency"--productivity or output/
strong negative correlation (0.58) between income and tran- input--is presented on the horizontal axis as boardings per
sit ridership per hour. In other words, the higher the income, hour.
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Table 5-5. Denver RTD subsidy per boarding and boardings per hour.
Subsidy per Boarding Boardings per Hour
Class of Service
Average 10% Max. 25% Max. Average 10% Min. 25% Min.
CBD Local $ 2.72 $ 6.52 $ 4.71 33.3 18.5 25.6
Urban Local 3.51 11.20 7.53 26.2 14.3 20.0
Suburban Local 7.95 18.48 13.46 14.4 6.6 10.3
Call-n-Ride 14.76 24.38 19.79 4.1 0.7 2.3
Express 6.22 13.86 10.22 28.5 8.8 18.2
Regional 6.82 14.46 10.81 18.2 10.7 14.3
SkyRide 4.26 6.37 5.37 18.3 13.0 15.5
Vanpool 1.19 N/A N/A 5.2 N/A N/A
CBD = central business district.
$0
169
121
($5)
Gateway
66 169Ltd
($10)
Subsidy Per Vehicle
324
($15)
327
325 402Ltd
($20)
426
60 Shaded domains contain all
routes meeting the 10%
($25) Longmont minimum standards
59Ltd 77
403 470Ltd
($30)
Lone Tree Minimum productivity
for 15 min frequency
75
($35)
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Boardings Per Vehicle Hour
Note: triangles represent fixed routes, and diamonds represent call-and-ride routes.
Figure 5-19. Denver RTD service performance for suburban local routes and call-n-ride services.
RTD service standards are depicted in Figure 5-19 to help RTD's graph makes it easy to single out poorly performing
decision makers make judgments about performance. Each routes for further evaluation. Other transit agencies can use
shaded rectangle represents the domain for routes that meet or this graph as a model to create similar graphs relevant to their
exceed the 10% minimum performance requirements for that own areas. By evaluating the suburban services, transit agen-
service type."10% minimum" is defined as meeting or exceed- cies can ensure that expectations in a community are com-
ing 10% of the performance for all routes in each category. mensurate with performance.
